Review: Cruel and Tender (Canadian Stage)
By Wayne Leung
Canadian Stage presents Martin Crimp’s play Cruel and Tender directed by Atom Egoyan at Toronto’s St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts.
Cruel and Tender is British playwright Martin Crimp’s contemporary adaptation of Sophocles’ Trachiniae (The Women of Trachis), a tale of love, jealousy and deceit between Greek hero Heracles, his wife Deianeira and lole, daughter of the king of Euboas, a city captured by Heracles. Read the rest of this entry »
Review: Penny Plain (Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes | Factory Theatre)
By Megan Mooney
Ronny Burkett’s Penny Plain at Factory Theatre in Toronto is far more than a playful puppet show
These days we have a tendency to think of shows involving puppets as light fun fare meant for children. Let me assure you, this is not the case with Ronny Burkett’s Penny Plain, currently playing at Factory Theatre.
The show is funny, but it’s also heartbreaking and dark, and it is most definitely not for children. In fact, the Factory Theatre website notes that children under 14 will not be admitted into the show, and with good reason. In parts it’s downright scary, not to mention more than a little creepy.
It’s also wonderful.
Review: Caroline, or Change (Acting Up Stage Company & Obsidian Theatre)
By Wayne Leung
Toronto’s Acting Up Stage Company & Obsidian Theatre present the Canadian premiere of Caroline, or Change at the Berkeley Street Theatre through February 12, 2012.
The teaming-up of two formidable Toronto theatre companies to produce the Canadian premiere of a Broadway musical is cause for excitement. Caroline, or Change seems a natural fit for Acting Up Stage Company, renowned for their hard-hitting musicals like last year’s Parade, and Obsidian Theatre whose recent, critically-acclaimed productions Ruined and Topdog/Underdog highlight the work of Black artists and playwrights.
Announcement: Theatre 20′s inaugural season of production features two new Canadian musicals and Sondheim’s Company
By Sonia Borkar
From Press Release
Joseph Aragon’s Bloodless: The Trial of Burke and Hare makes its Toronto premiere and Raindogs by Andrew MacBean will be presented in partnership with Sheridan College’s Canadian Music Theatre Project
Theatre 20, Toronto’s artist-led musical theatre company, today announced its inaugural season of production at a press conference and exclusive ticketed cocktail affair, “A Taste of 20: Sample the Season”. The event launches a season which includes two workshops, two full productions, and a series of other events.
Cheap Theatre in Toronto for the Week of January 23, 2012
By Sonia Borkar
Five For Twenty (or Less)
This week’s cheap theatre has a multi-cultural flavour to it. There’s a show that deals with an illegal immigrant’s search for his sister, the other looks at an Indo-Canadian’s vacation back home, there’s a couple of Greek mythology inspired shows and lastly a double bill dance show. There’s definitely enough variety here for you to pick something and experience some super cheap, live theatre this week. Get out there and catch a show!
Review: Tosca (Canadian Opera Company)
By Keira Grant
Tosca, one of Giacomo Puccini’s best known operas, is a tale of political intrigue, murder, passion and love. The Canadian Opera Company’s most recent interpretation of this work premiered on January 21 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. I should preface this by saying that Puccini is my favourite composer of opera and Tosca is one of my favourite of his works so my expectations were high. Read the rest of this entry »
Review: My Heart is a Spoon – First Incarnation (Across Oceans)
By Samantha Wu
My Heart is a Spoon is a work in progress in development at The Theatre Centre in Toronto with its first incarnation showing January 19 – 22.
What is rage? How do you express it and where does it come from? How does it affect you? Where does it affect you? This is what My Heart is a Spoon (produced by Across Oceans) explores through the use of dance and movement, music, vocalized sound, lights and projected manga imagery on the walls and floor. Read the rest of this entry »
[Sponsored] Hart House 2012 Winter Classes – Empowerment Through the Arts
By Megan Mooney
University of Toronto’s Hart House classes in Toronto offer Empowerment Through the Arts – for anyone moved by an image, a word or an idea.
There’s little in this world I love more than learning something new. Technically any learning goes to personal development, but the best kind of learning is stuff that is both fun AND intended for personal development.
The biggest life-changing learning I ever did was in my grade 10 drama class. It taught me how to interact with the world in a whole new, and far more effective, way. It also started an introduction to my passion – theatre – but that was a ways down the road. In my business-world career doing performance measurement and program evaluation I used the skills I learned through arts classes every day.
That’s what Hart House is offering with its “Empowerment Through the Arts” classes. I don’t doubt that these will offer you skills that you will use in all sorts of areas of your life. In addition to their previous offerings in Filmmaking, Photography, Music and Theatre Arts, they now offer classes in Comedy, Creative Living & Careers, Movement/Dance and expanded Voice offerings.
It’s a wide ranging selection, with offerings from The Art of Conversation and Communication to Free Your Inner Comedian to Art of Acting: Finding Personal Liberation and Authenticity. Generally, the classes are aimed to those who but do not already have training in the specific class they are taking. There’s a full list of the various classes here, most of which begin the week of January 29.
Eye-Catching Toronto Theatre for the Week of January 23, 2012
By Sonia Borkar
Here is what’s going on in Toronto theatre this week. There are several great shows to catch for the week of January 23, 2012: ** Shows marked with the double asterisks and in red are the ones that make Wayne, our Managing Editor, wish he could exist in multiple parallel universes so he could check them all out. Read the rest of this entry »
Review: Other People (Mutual Friends in collaboration with Mercedes Grundy)
By Adam Collier
The first thing my theatre partner said at intermission was, “I lovvve the actor playing Petra!”
Well, no – that’s not quite true. It was, “Yesssss!”
That was her beaming reply to whether she was enjoying Other People, onstage until January 28th at the Tank House Theatre at the Young Centre for the Performing Arts.